Of the seven participants in best singers Blanks certainly had the best hair and the happiest head. Thursday evening was his 25th birthday and it was also ‘his’ evening, which meant that the six fellow singers each gave their own twist to a song of his and sang it to him. And Blanks unwrapped his music presents like the best. You could get all the emotions off his face in this way, and if you looked to the left of him, at Claudia de Breij’s face, you could see all sorts of things happening in her too. As if she was on the birthday of her favorite brother or – it’s just possible – her son.
Blanks is the stage name of Simon de Wit, who grew up on a farm in a Groningen village with 18 inhabitants. He was the youngest, but certainly not the smallest performer in the group. 1.3 million subscribers to his Youtube channel. Roxeanne Hazes and Jaap Reesema echoed “1.3 million”. 750,000 listeners on Spotify in America, Germany and England. “I’m also sometimes listened to in Belgium,” Nielson said. Followed on Twitter by Post Malone. Likes from Ariane Grande. “Ariane Grande,” sighed the singers.
He owes his success mainly to his ‘style swaps’. There was also a huge generation gap here, but he explained it briefly. He takes a well-known song by a famous artist and puts it in a new jacket. Preferably a jacket that is as nerdy as possible from the eighties. Because “uncool is the new cool.” Hence his pearl necklace, his chipped nail polish, nose ring and the endearing looks of Claudia de Breij. Packing someone else’s song in your own form, that’s been the formula of for fifteen years now best singers. And that always results in happy, surprised, moved, surprised looks, and usually tears too.
A mechanical panda bear, a coconut scraper and a coffee table also seem to be able to evoke those emotions. Discovery started a new season of The Repair Shop. The idea, originally from the BBC, is simple. People bring a defective heirloom to a very nostalgic workshop in a very rural location. And there are craftsmen ready to restore the object.
The bringers are usually a bit older than high school and what they bring is usually more than worn out. In English that sounds like: “In a bit of a sorry state.” You would feel sorry for the translators of this program, because specialisms, tools and parts come along that already sound quite odd in Dutch.
cute panda bear
The crux of the program is, of course, why a moth-eaten panda bear, a rusted coconut scraper and a hideous table represent so much emotional value. The bear was a present for her sixth birthday sixty years ago, says the owner. Her father bought it for her, he died shortly after her birthday. The three brothers cherish the scraper because their father made it and they used to be allowed to operate it. The table bringer remembers how happy his parents were when they bought the plywood table. This table is as beautiful as it was then, that’s what he wishes as a gift for his seventieth birthday.
And a gift it is, because the hours that the woodworkers, soft-toy specialists, clockmakers put in are priceless. Each item is disassembled and oiled, sanded, jolted, filed and stitched piece by piece. So much fiddling, fiddling, you as a viewer have to be up to it. But see what all that patience produces: happy old faces and new old stuff.